The First Iowa 2012 TV Ad

It's a bit early to be running presidential campaign ads, but not for Fred Karger.

Karger is (unofficially, at this point) running for president as a Republican, on an almost exclusively gay-rights platform. A former Ronald Reagan aide who is now openly gay, it's Karger's goal to make it onstage at televised Republican debates and make hay over the party's traditional gay-rights stances. See a previous post on Karger here.

He's now airing a 90-second TV ad statewide in Iowa. Beginning today, it will run twice a day on Fox News for one week throughout the state, according to Karger's exploratory committee.

The Iowa Democratic Party confirms that this is the first GOP 2012 ad they've seen aired in the Hawkeye State so far.

Karger has mad multiple trips to Iowa and New Hampshire this year. He's looking to raise $5 million for his campaign, which would sustain him through one or two early primary states as he seeks to push the GOP in a new direction on gay rights issues. He previously aired a one-minute TV ad in New Hampshire.

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Chris Good is a political reporter for ABC News. He was previously an associate editor at The Atlantic and a reporter for The Hill.